I just sat down to write after creating a new iteration of my hummus recipe. Each batch has its own special characteristics. This time involved a bigger change. I was well into the process when I realized I did not have any tahini in the pantry. Tahini is essentially sesame seed butter. My recipe calls for 1/2 cup. Before panicking, I realized I had a potential substitute: sunflower seed butter. I acknowledge that might not be such a common item that people have in their pantry either. Either way, I was lucky to have enough of it, and it worked! The hummus is delicious, slightly on the sweeter side, and surprisingly good. Let me know if you want the recipe.
Speaking of new iterations, I made a really big decision this week. Are you guys tired of me doing that yet? I feel like I’ve just been announcing things in my Substack the last 4-6 months, and I’m kind of over it. I am so grateful to all of you for sticking with me this far. We are on the brink of something really special, and the only way to know it is to live it together, as we go.
My big decision was to step away from teaching in-person yoga studio classes here in Nashville.
Many of you know yoga has been a huge part of my life over the last four years. I took my first studio class at Shakti Power Yoga on April 17th, 2021. By the end of my 30-day intro special, I was hooked. I committed to the monthly membership. After almost two years of consistent practice, I embarked on their yoga teacher training from January to April, 2023. I kept my momentum going and jumped right into teaching. I’ve taught studio and outreach classes for Small World Yoga since 2023. I’ve also taught in studio at Shakti since 2023 and in studio at Sanctuary for Yoga since the end of this last year.
The decision to stop teaching in these spaces really came down to my values and long-term goals. Anyone looking in from the outside, without knowing the details might be quite surprised. In the last few months, I really hit a stride teaching. Attendance for one of my classes has been over capacity every week.
This is all wonderful and truly fulfilling as it was a dream I didn’t think was possible when I started practicing. Even going into teacher training, I didn’t think I could ever be “a yoga teacher in this amazing studio on Music Row.” I had it all on such a pedestal, which I only ended up having to deconstruct in order to become one in a community. It became a real hindrance to conceptualize any of it as this lofty thing to achieve. Going through training and stepping into the leadership role only required me to connect more authentically with the community. The process right sized everything. I couldn’t stand in front of room of people taking my class and fake it. Every single class I taught, as uncomfortable as it was, peeled back another layer of any facades I still had up.
As I tell my yoga teacher friends about my decision, I repeat something I’ve said before. I’m so grateful for the way yoga has brought me home to myself, which in turn has attracted very genuine friendships.
Yoga will always be a part of daily practice, and this is not to say I am done facilitating yoga/meditation sessions altogether. This could just be for the next season. It may be transforming into something I continue independently on a monthly or quarterly basis, possibly an in-person gathering with a virtual option. We shall see. One thing at a time. There is some new iteration forming. Right now, I’m going to honor the ending of a chapter. My last Yin Yoga + Sound class at Shakti will be Friday, March 7th, 5-6pm. My last Restorative & Sound class at Sanctuary will be Sunday, March 9th, 5-6:15pm.
I have a list of 14 values that I identified with helpful guidance from a coach. I know I mention past or current mentors and coaches a lot. I’m never trying to make anyone feel like it is required to go out and find one for your personal process. All I can share is my experience, and it has been so helpful for me, for several years in a row now.
About a month ago, I tediously combed through each one of my values and answered the same four writing prompts for each value:
[what this value means to you]
[how is this value met/fulfilled and how do you know that it is being fulfilled]
[how is this value violated / where is the boundary within in this value]
[why is this value important to you]
There are four values in particular (out of the 14), which the studio teaching was bumping up against:
Commitment
Natural expression
Working for myself
Mobility (working from anywhere - a big part of my overall life vision includes lots of travel)
The weeks following that writing assignment, which ended up being a 9-page document, I began to notice a distinct frustration rising. I’ve felt it before, the jumbled resentment, when my energy is split between different things I’m trying to offer more of my focus to. Classes were seemingly going really well, but that didn’t carry as much power as all of my very clearly identified values. They took the driver’s seat on the trajectory of my path.
Ultimately, I want to write for a living.
Ultimately, I will write.
My word this year is FULLNESS. I will step into my fullness.
I am stepping into my new, more specific iteration of conduit and scribe.
I had a very specific vision about a year and a half ago, right before my Substack’s first birthday. Here’s the link to the full post, followed by the pasted quote I want to highlight.
I came to a bridge, which I knew I was meant to cross, even though there were other nearby bridges that were more modern, popular, and secure. I sat in my writing chair this weekend not sure where to go with my writing. I closed my eyes. After several rounds of controlled breath in stillness, I was standing at the entrance to this rickety, wood bridge again. To my surprise, I received the strong sense that I was meant to cross it then and there. Fear flooded my body. I didn’t know what it meant or what was going to happen in the visualization.
What I did know is that I was meant to start stepping across it. Ultimately, not even fear can take that knowing from me in situations now.
I began to walk across the bridge.
I started to feel lighter. My steps slowed. Gravity left me. I suddenly realized I was walking in water.
I started to shake with giggling laughter. When I was standing at the entrance of the bridge, I couldn’t see that it was under crystal clear, still water. From where I stood, it looked like a bridge suspended in air over a canyon, miles from the ground below. Only once I started to step did I realize I couldn’t fall. I would be walking through water I didn’t initially see was there.
I think I’m realizing this is where I’ve been this year. I’ve been crossing this bridge from one life season to the next. I’ve known it is meant for me, even though it was terrifying to begin stepping.
I found myself in the water. I found I could keep stepping. I could even slow down. I could stop and float sometimes, as long as I held onto the bridge. My fear of falling was transmuted by the peace of the water. Instead of trying to cross as fast as I could, I started making sure I didn’t miss anything along the way. If I didn’t see the water when I first started, what else did I not understand about the path? I stayed curious about what else there was to see.
Eventually the wandering curiosity landed back with a prompt to keep it simple.
A bridge is for crossing. Keep stepping.
So I did.
As I write this, I sense that I am at the end of this particular bridge. I stand in the water and feel the rope on either side of me still in my hands. I look forward and see grass and dirt. I see solid ground. There is no going back, so I will go forward.
I keep standing still before I take the step. The earth in front of me feels so sure. It seems so certain. I got used to the flexibility and fluidity of the water. I got used to transition. I knew the bridge wasn’t a destination when I started walking across, so I could look forward to where it was leading me.
I don’t know what I’m looking forward to when I step towards this new earth.
I’ve come far enough to know that the way is not to turn around and go back.
My Substack will turn one year old this month (written 10/15/23). I have thought about quitting before that date to avoid acknowledging it and potentially feeling any pressure with the anniversary. I am afraid of it because of how special this place has become for me. I experience fear of losing it. I experience fear of it changing. I experience fear of it staying the same. I experience a little fear every time I sit down to write.
Fear is ravenous and insatiable.
I recall my fear was transmuted into peace by stepping out onto the bridge in my vision. I came to discover very real support I didn’t know was there at first- the water.
When I write, my fear is transmuted into love. What is the equivalent to the water in this case? Is it you all being here with me? Is it just the nature of creativity? What is the secret sauce here? I’m not really sure how to describe it in this moment.
Fear is ravenous and insatiable. It will keep taking as much as I feed it.
Love needs nothing and is fulfilled in itself.
As long as I keep finding that love, I will keep stepping in the way it illuminates.
And here is a love-infused sentence that my fearful self didn’t expect to say to you all in today’s post:
I look forward to celebrating Seeing Upside Down’s birthday with you all next week.
with love,
Jeannie Lynn
Um, can we all please thank past-Jeannie Lynn?!?! What in the heck?
Another development of that vision, which I didn’t write about was a wooden sign posted in the ground at the entrance of the bridge. I can’t remember if I saw this in another meditation, or the same one. The sign was marked with one word in white paint: ‘WRITING’ with an arrow under it pointing across the rickety bridge.
I’ve seen it in my mind over and over and over.
I became more and more sensitive to anything pulling me off course from the direction of that sign.
I believe we all have that. Agitation after agitation, until we are ready to shed the next layer. The exposure gets closer and closer to the heart of us. Our natural evolution is determined by our ability to soften and let go of what we’ve been hiding behind.
I am walking by faith. God has given me the clearest direction I’ve ever received, while simultaneously keeping me blind to what will come as a result of these steps.
I feel like I’ve been vulnerable already, and my heart is asking me to open up even more.
I can’t believe I’m going to do this.
In November of 2022, I brought Dom into the office of our old house on Swiss (tears already). I felt crazy, kind of how I feel a little crazy right now. I showed him what I pasted with a glue stick onto my vision board. It was in the bottom right corner of the poster board designated for 2024-2025. It was a little strip of text from a magazine cutout: International Bestselling Author + Speaker. With him as a witness, I wrote a note next to it: glued 11/29/2022.
I would not be sharing this if I didn’t have a perfect track record of manifesting every dream I’ve dared to commit myself to over the course of my life. Do not mistake that to say I’ve done it perfectly. It has been a WILD ride, equal darkness as there is to light. I’ve hurt myself. I’ve hurt people. I walk in living amends to everything and everyone who has granted me this life. There are more points on my path than most of you are aware of, when my life here on earth could have easily ended. For some reason it did not. For some reason. There is a purpose. And I will never stop seeking it. The more I discover, the less I want to define it.
It is very funny to me, and I’m also not kidding when I say I could care less if I’m an international bestselling author + speaker. Honestly, it sounds like a lot of work. At the same time, if it were to magically happen, one could look at the trail that led to this point and see that there was nothing magical about it.
I dreamed it during a time when I still cared about titles. I knew that I loved writing, but I didn’t understand yet that I am supposed to write.
New iterations keep forming as I direct my focus. I feel more calm than I expected to feel after showing you that up-close-and-personal detail of my vision board.
I suppose I realized I have nothing to lose. All I care about is continuing to follow my intuition, which I believe is the voice of God within me. If they want to show off and manifest that, then I won’t be surprised. I figure why not bring you all along to see what happens.
If things don’t come into fruition in that particular way after all, I am sure it will be very clear as to why.
At the very least, any dream gets us going.
The first step looks as small as glueing a strip of magazine paper onto a collage of words.
The steps keep stringing together until we give all we can give. The rest of the way requires us to let go of the outcome. When we find our true nature, it allows us to let go of the forcing and striving to make it anything other than what it is.
Right now, I have decided to de-commit myself from teaching weekly in-person yoga classes to make myself fully available to the writing process and the release of my first book this summer.
That’s what I know I am supposed to do right now. I know that more will be revealed exactly when it’s meant to be revealed.
I could have easily strung you all along and not told you exactly what’s going on until I had more definite success in sight.
Where’s the fun in that?
Now you all get to see if I’m crazy or if I’m crazy.
I’m honestly starting to see that I do have magical qualities. We all do! I can’t help but think about my name and how powerful names are. ‘Jeannie’ is pronounced like ‘genie.’
What’s the character of the genie without sharing their magic with someone else?
I might as well document this stuff and not wait for someone to discover it when I’m gone from this life. Maybe I want to see what people think now. I’m selfish. I don’t want to wait until I’m dead.
I’m supposed to write it down.
Here are the next handful of contemplations going into the book. You’ll see some parallels with what I’ve shared this week.
Love you all.
Jeannie Lynn
INTEGRATE
It all comes full circle. You’ve waited for someday, and here it is. In the end, all you find is the beginning. Lay it all down, and the rest comes. See where your knees land and notice the way something lifts your chin up. You are here for a reason. Lighten up with the plans and remember this is already your masterpiece. Take a moment to gaze at what you have. More and more light found its way through every single thing that fell apart. The journey shatters your illusions. Let the scattered pieces fly free. Home always finds you whole. You were here all along. It all comes full circle.
SURRENDER
Minimize. Overextension puts your expression to sleep. Follow inspiration without reaching for it. Receive everything and possess nothing. It is all coming to you now. All of your efforts finally led you to do less. The juggling days transform into a singular flow. You utilized everything you had, propelling you to slow down. Give in to true rest. This is a master project all in itself. It takes however long it takes. Know your work. Become intimate with your rest. The two start to go hand in hand, without opposition. This is Nature. It moves according to what it already knows: its limits and its greatest potential. The flower and all its petals lay in the soil. It is neither a victory nor a defeat. It has transcended the need to have either. It is exactly where it is supposed to be, with everything taken into consideration. You are no exception. Minimize.
RENOUNCE
Your path is unique to you. Someone else could never follow it with the same steps you took. Watch it gradually disintegrate behind you. The only observable pattern is the way you follow your intuition, your heart, your innate wisdom, your knowing within. Learn what you need to learn and move on. No need to linger for another accomplishment or title. Your ultimate home is in need of your presence. You would know if this was it by now. Let go of even more. Follow the unexplainable pull. Good. Better. Best. This is the dynamic life. It always changes on the outside. Your unchanging self enjoys the ride if you connect with that innermost part of you. Loosen attachments to external pieces. See what follows you without pulling it on a leash. It’s better that way anyway. Your path is unique to you.
DISSOLVE
You face a decision. You are about to merge with something else. It may not be clear how everything will play out. It calls to you regardless. Your path owes nobody an explanation. Be yourself. Let the rest fall away. Make space for what is relentlessly pursuing you. It is what you have relentlessly pursued. Melt below the familiar surface. Find your moment of truth. You see it by trusting it. Nothing will force you. It requires your choice and your allowance. This is not up to anybody else. This is the responsibility of your Essence. Know it. Own it. You either follow it or you don’t. You face a decision.
DISAPPEAR
To leave something does not always mean to quit. Someone can just as well quit by staying. Sometimes a greater purpose asks us to stay. Just as often, it asks us to leave. Consider if this is a chapter trying to close or continue. Only you can decipher. Allow yourself to consider both scenarios very carefully; imagine each storyline extensively. You are the director. Play the tape as far into the future as you can. Is this really the direction you are ultimately going? No matter what, it has been formative, changing the course of your life forever. That is something to honor. If it is time to say goodbye, give yourself that chance before vanishing into the horizon. The flame becomes the smoke. The smoke becomes invisible. The flower finishes its lifecycle, and breaks back down into the earth. A death only leads to a seed for new life. To leave something does not always mean to quit.
Below is a video of another interesting layer to everything. I tell a story about how I met someone very special at Target.
Under the video, I leave you with a link to a specific episode on my friend Aubrey’s podcast The Infinite Drop. She and her guest get to talking about the concepts written on the whiteboard behind me in this week’s video. If you listen to the episode, you’ll see why I wrote those words down.
Who doesn’t love a little scavenger hunt? I think you’ll actually have a lot of fun with it, connecting the stories written above with the story in the video. Then, listen to the linked podcast episode under that and connect the dots to the words on the whiteboard in the video.
I have a feeling when I get to the end of this year, it’s going to be like that movie or series I finish and want to immediately watch again. I am going to want to watch this footage back for the damn good story it is shaping up to be.
Thank you for coming along for the ride. It’s more fun, for me personally, to share this experience with my community, who may someday have some very cool things to share in return…
I can only dream.
I dream of Jeannie, whatever it means to be in her fullness.
I dream of her, and she keeps becoming.
She shares as she goes, but it’s not for you to find her.
Let her disappear behind the stories
so that you can find you.
With love,
The conduit